Sabaragamuwa University Journal Volume 12 Number 1; December 2013, pp 61-82 ISSN 1391-3166 The Goa-Ceylon Religious Connection: A Review of the ‘The Indian Cry’ of Alvares Mar Julius, Archbishop of Ceylon, Goa and India Pratima P. Kamat Goa University. India. Abstract Goa, a former Portuguese colony and, at present, a state of the Republic of India, located on the west coast of the subcontinent, has an interesting history of commercial and cultural contacts with Ceylon that were nurtured through the maritime route, especially during the colonial period. Portuguese Goa enjoyed thriving trade relations with the Ilha de Ceilão. It also participated in the Christianisation of this island both under the Portuguese and later, in the seventeenth century, when the Goan priest, Fr. Joseph Vaz, and other Oratorians, made a bid to revive Roman Catholicism there. In 1885, Msgr. Sebastião Rodolfo Dalgado was deputed to Ceylon as its Vicar-General. He served there for two years and with the surrender of their mission of Ceylon by the Portuguese, he returned to Goa in 1887. And in the very same year, 1887, another Goan priest, Padre Alvares, journeyed to Ceylon to contribute to its religious history: initially, to rally the Goan clergy posted there in their fight against the Concordat of 1886, and later to perform his episcopal duties as the Archbishop of Ceylon, Goa and India. Alvares Mar Julius, also known as Padre Alvares, was an editor, writer, founder of educational and social institutions, patriot and, above all, a dedicated social worker. In the pursuit of the spiritual and socio-political uplift of his people, Padre Alvares was branded seditious by the colonial Government of Goa, ex-communicated by the Roman Catholic Church, and elevated to episcopal stature by the Syrian Orthodox Church in the last quarter of the nineteenth century. The present article focuses on the socio-political contributions of Alvares Mar Julius both before he joined the Syrian Orthodox Church and after. It examines the ideology of economic nationalism espoused by Padre Alvares, the “swadeshi” (nationalist) ideology, and attempts to situate this revolutionary priest in the context of local resistance to colonial hegemony in nineteenth century Goa. Further, it reviews the contributions of Alvares Mar Julius to the Syrian Orthodox Church which have been many-fold, with a special focus on his activities in Ceylon in the context of The Padroado Defence Association, the Independent Catholic Mission, and as his mission-field. “I have fought the Good Fight I have finished the race I have kept the faith.”1 --- 2 Timothy 4:7-8 61 Sabaragamuwa University Journal 2013, V. 12 NO. 1 pp 61-82 Introduction A couple of years ago, the High Commissioner of Sri Lanka in India, Prasad Kariyawasam, had said: “Portuguese had their first introduction to Sri Lanka in Galle, a southern port city in 1505 and ‘Goa, God’s own paradise’ and ‘Sri Lanka, a land like no other’ have common threads.”2 Indeed, Goa, a former Portuguese colony and, at present, a state of the Indian Union located on its west coast, has an interesting history of commercial and cultural contacts with Ceylon that were nurtured through the maritime route, especially during the colonial period. While Sri Lanka, like Goa, was a trading post for Arabian, Persian, Greek and Chinese traders in the ancient and early medieval times, “Goa and Galle saw their paths meet with the conquest by the Portuguese.”3 Sri Lanka had experienced the rule of three successive European powers from 1505 to 1948: the Portuguese (1505-1658), the Dutch (1658-1796) and the British (1796-1948). The “rule” of these three European powers was sometimes “nothing more than a presence that grew, spread, or declined in space and time” (EWC, 2006: 23). During the period of the Portuguese presence, from 1505 to 1658, Goa’s contacts with Ceylon, particularly, Colombo, Galle and Jaffna, expanded. The islands of Goa had been captured by the Portuguese in 1510. According to some, Ceylon, “This loveliest parcel of land the Creator has placed in this Earth,”4 (Pieris, 1920) should have served as “the centrepiece of Portugal’s political, military and colonial policy in Asia” and been made its headquarters (Zupanov, 2006). However, it was Goa that was accorded the status of the capital of the Estado da Índia (the Portuguese State of India) in 1530. And since, the contacts between the two lands increased manifold. Trade, especially in spices, cinnamon in particular, flourished and Portuguese Goa enjoyed thriving commercial relations with the Ilha de Ceilão. Ceylon was also used to deport the condemned and the exiles found guilty by the High Court at Goa and the Goa Inquisition. The convicts were generally sent to war-torn regions where there was an acute need of manpower, and in the early seventeenth century, in the wake of internal wars and the Dutch incursions, the rate of deportation from Goa to Ceylon increased considerably (de Souza, 2010). The Goa-Ceylon Religious Connect Goa had also participated in the Christianisation of this island under the Portuguese. It had thus contributed to the ‘temporal and spiritual conquest of Ceylon’5 by the Portuguese in the sixteenth and the first half of the seventeenth centuries. In 1658, the Dutch commercial company, the Verenigde Oost- Indische Compagnie (VOC, or Dutch United East India Company), which had entered the Sri Lankan scene at the beginning of the seventeenth century, succeeded in upstaging the Portuguese from the island. In his book, The Pratima P. Kamat 62 Sabaragamuwa University Journal 2013, V. 12 NO. 1 pp 61-82 Temporal and Spiritual Conquest of Ceylon, written in 1688 and published in 1916, Queiroz, had given a call to “go back and reclaim this land for Portugal and for God” (Zupanov, 2006). Under the Calvinist Dutch, the Roman Catholic converts of Ceylon had suffered considerably and hence there were some, like Queiroz, who made repeated appeals for the Portuguese recon quest of Ceylon with a view to alleviate the plight of the local Catholics (Zupanov, 2006). While an irreversible decline had already set in the Estado da Índia rendering the temporal recovery of Ceylon to nought, its spiritual recon quest was still considered with favour by some missionaries. In the seventeenth century, a Goan priest, Fr. Joseph Vaz, and the Congregação do Oratório de Santa Cruz dos Milagres (Congregation of the Oratory of the Cross of Miracles), also known as the Oratorians, Milagristas, Padres Bragmanes, etc., converted this island into their mission- field in a bid to revive Roman Catholicism there. The Oratorian Sri Lankan mission contributed in no mean mite to the continuance of the Roman Catholic religion and the jurisdiction of the Padroado Real on this island. Padroado Real, or the Crown Patronage of the Church, which exemplified the “the indissoluble union of the Cross and the Crown” (Boxer, 1969) was a set of privileges granted by the Holy See to the King of Portugal to spread Christianity and to name the personnel for this purpose, in all the lands in the East “discovered or yet to be discovered (repertis et reperiendis)” by them. The Padroado “was one of the most jealously guarded and tenaciously maintained prerogatives of the Portuguese Crown” (Boxer, 1969) and could not be revoked by the Vatican without the prior consent of the monarch of Portugal. The Padroado was abolished in Ceylon and these dioceses were placed under the Propaganda Fide with the signing of the Concordat between the Holy See and Portugal in 1886 and the subsequent Papal Bull, Humanae salutatis auctor of 1 September 1886, (Abba Seraphim, 2006).6 With the renunciation of its claims in Ceylon by Portugal, Goa’s religious jurisdiction in that territory ceased. The Padroado Real had provided Goans an opportunity to serve in Ceylon. Amongst them was the eminent Msgr. Sebastião Rodolfo Dalgado who was deputed to Ceylon as Vicar-General in 1885. He served there for two years and with the surrender of their mission of Ceylon by the Portuguese, he returned to Goa in 1887. And in the very same year, 1887, yet another Goan priest, Padre Alvares, journeyed to Colombo to contribute to the religious history of Sri Lanka: initially, to rally the Goan clergy posted there in their fight against the Concordat of 1886, and later to perform his episcopal duties as the Metropolitan of Ceylon, Goa and India, excluding Malabar. Bishop Alvares, known as Padre A.F.X. Alvares in Goa, was an editor, writer, founder of educational and social institutions, patriot and, above all, a dedicated 63 The Goa-Ceylon Religious Connection: A Review of the ‘The Indian Cry’ of Alvares Mar Julius, Archbishop of Ceylon, Goa and India Sabaragamuwa University Journal 2013, V. 12 NO. 1 pp 61-82 social worker to whom the church was “the community of Faith, hope and charity,”7 and who aspired to make the civil and ecclesiastical administration of Portuguese Goa likewise. This firebrand journalist and fearless patriot used his pen and raised his voice to fight against the corruption and malpractices in the contemporary colonial administration of Goa. In the pursuit of the spiritual and socio-political uplift of the people, Alvares was branded seditious by the colonial government of Goa and forced to leave the Roman Catholic Church. He joined the Syrian Orthodox Church which consecrated him archbishop of Ceylon, Goa and India (excluding Malabar) with the title of Mar Julius. The present article focuses on the socio-political contributions of Alvares Mar Julius within the framework of his “swadeshi” (nationalist) ideology, both before he joined the Syrian Orthodox Church and after. He embraced the Syrian Orthodox Church believing it to be more Indian and Asian in its activities.